Social media has changed the way youngsters interact, learn, work and play. Many youngsters these days seek to draw attention to their achievements, literary works or photographs by sharing them on their social networks. When it comes to photos, they may need to use editing tools to come up with a picture that makes their friends go ‘wow,’ a task that may be difficult without professional guidance. Sanjat Mishra, a techie who became famous by creating the promotional posters for the UK territory for the movie Bahubali, is offering free online tutorials, which even an amateur can follow to create amazing photographs.
The Bangalore-based Sanjat, who originally hails from Bolangir, has started the free tutorial initiative for a noble cause. He provides tutorials on YouTube in photo designing and poster making in the Odia and Koshli languages to help fellow Odia people who cannot follow instructions in any other language. Later he plans to offer tutorials in Hindi and English too. Sunday POST talked to Sanjat recently to learn more about the tutorials.
“There are many talented people in Odisha who want to create innovative photos but can’t follow the instructions, if given in Hindi or English,” said Sanjat. “Keeping this in mind, I have provided the narration in Odia and Sambalpuri (Koushali/Koshli). After the lowering of the Internet usage tariff, and especially after Jio bandwidth came to Odisha, many people have Internet on their phones. So, I expect that a large number of people will benefit from my tutorials on photo editing and design tools, starting with Photoshop. It will be great if people can ask their problems on the comment section under the Youtube Videos. It will be easier for me to create tutorial on the problematic topic.”
Asked how an Odia youngster can benefit from his tutorials, Sanjat said, “In Odisha, people offer small assignments. They want mixed photos for weddings, birthdays or functions, and from such assignments, one can easily earn some money. Besides, the tutorial will also help school/college students to beautify their projects (presentations).”
“I have struggled a lot to master the art. Then, the course fee was around 40,000 rupees. Now, it is around 4 lakh rupees. However, after going through my tutorials, one can earn without paying anything,” he added.
Sanjat said that he could provide online work too if required. “People can earn from that. I always try to create employment opportunities for my fellow Odia brethren.”
He continued: “I have started with the ‘Photoshop’ editing tool. This is used even for feature films. For ‘Bahubali,’ I made many posters using this tool. There are other tools like ‘Illustrator’ and ‘corelDRAW’ but I have chosen this as it has enough features to satisfy the creative urge of a user. With a random search, people can learn a few things, but if they follow my tutorials, they can be experts. I have observed that people attempt to edit photos on their own but often don’t come up with a perfect finished output. For example, they may want to merge two photos, but when the colour and light of the subject and the background don’t match, the product looks odd. My tutorials can guide them better on such issues.”
“One can create ‘double exposure’ and ‘triple exposure’ photos in Photoshop. Here multiple photos are mixed to create a single innovative one. Like, you can take a human portrait and merge a picturesque road in it. One knows it is an edited photo, but the product appeals to creative people. Of course, this is different from collage,” he added.
Sanjat plans to give lessons on logo creation, conceptualisation . “Then the next step will be social networking, because once he grasps the art, it is time to sell and this is possible only through social networks. Later, I will also offer tutorials on multimedia for creative videos.”
These days, VFX is a popular term. “VFX is tough for amateurs,” explained Sanjat. “You need to make a huge investment to buy VFX software and an at par system to run it. Commonly configured systems’ RAM will be dead after getting a VFX rendering command. Rendering of a VFX file is very tough for the system. In ‘Bahubali,’ about 3,000 people were engaged only for VFX and the rendering was mostly done in China because of which it became a costly film. Again, rendering of VFX files take a lot of time since it works frame by frame.”
“If I provide tutorials on VFX, many people will start trying it in their systems. Their RAM may not be able to take the load. Still, if anybody wants to try, they can go for a software called ‘Houdini’ available online.”
Apart from technical knowhow, Sanjat said, creativity is important to create innovative photos. “You must have creativity. And I feel meditation is the mother of creativity. Before work, sit silently for a few minutes to concentrate and then start working. Again, you should be capable of analysing nature and your surroundings to get a reference.”
A recipient of Shree awards, Sanjat’s startup provides User Experience (UX) services, which is rare in India. His startup ‘UX Interface’ was among the best 10 Design Startups in India 2017 in a list compiled by Startupcity (Silicon India), one of the best 30 startups across domain in India, 2017 chosen by Insight Success, and one of the best 25 website design companies in India, 2018 on Silicon India’s list. His company was the social media promoter of ‘Baahubali’ in UK in association with Hamsini Entertainment.
Sanjat’s tutorial videos on YouTube:
- How to create your own customised brush in Photoshop
- Making use of own customised brush
- How masking works in Photoshop
- Masking in Photoshop with another image
- Clipping mask in Photoshop
- Image correction
- Double exposure
- Basic Photoshop tutorials, Tools Set – 1, 2 & 3 (three videos)
All these videos are available on YouTube channel SaMi’s World. You can also randomly search “Sanjat Mishra” on YouTube.
Himanshu Guru, OP